The invention relates to a seat belt alarm. More particularly, the invention relates to a system that warns a parent when the child has released the seat belt.
Highway safety statistics comparing accident victims who were wearing seat belts to those who were not are hard to ignore. In particular, it is quite clear that wearing a seat belt is a simple step that could easily save the life of a passenger. Accordingly, most adults wear seat belts.
Seat belt usage is particularly important for children. For this reason, it is in most respects mandatory for children to wear their seat belt when traveling in an automobile. Unfortunately, children typically do not like wearing a seat belt. It prevents them from following their natural, child impulses, and constrains their movements. As a result, it is common that a child will release his/her seat belt while the vehicle is in motion. The parents, however, are often unaware that their child is no longer restrained, and might suffer significant injury or worse if there was an accident.
For this reason, some have proposed alarms that seek to notify a parent that the child has released the seat belt.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,944,135 to Blackburn et al., U.S. Pat. No. 6,002,325 to Conaway, and U.S. Pat. No. 6,175,304 to Becker each disclose a system which is incorporated into the seat belt buckle which detects the presence or absence of the seat belt tongue therein. These references propose improved seat belt devices that can be incorporated into newly manufactured cars. Unfortunately, these references will not work with existing seat belt systems.
In this regard, U.S. Pat. No. 5,596,312 to Fowler et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 6,351,210 to Stewart both disclose systems which have a slot for accepting the tongue of the existing seat belt and locking the tongue therein, and then have an auxiliary tongue which is to be used with the existing buckle, for producing an alarm when the auxiliary tongue is released. These devices, however, are unnecessarily complex, and can be easily defeated by a clever child by simply unlocking the tongue of the existing belt from the slot.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,339,371 to Baggelaar et al. discloses a self contained, buckle attachable and actuated alarm device, which attaches beneath the seat belt buckle, and has a metal plate which is trapped between the seat belt tongue and the buckle, so that when the tongue is released, the plate will fall away and release a switch to trigger an alarm. Once again, Baggelaar et al. unnecessarily complicates the usage of the seat belt, and requires a plate that is easily lost when the seat belt is released.
While these units may be suitable for the particular purpose employed, or for general use, they would not be as suitable for the purposes of the present invention as disclosed hereafter.